17. Black Consumer
17. Black Consumer
"Did I just hear something strange...?"
Laura, who had stopped by the Food Supplies Management Head's office to file a report, climbed to the upper floor with a puzzled expression.
The central building where faculty gathered to handle their work had a straightforward layout. The top floor held the Chairwoman's office and the Finance Director's office. The floor below housed the department-head conference room and the Head of Academic Affairs' office.
Below that came the Planning Department Head's office, the Food Supplies Management Head's office, and the rest of the department heads' rooms.
The Student Affairs Department Head's office was housed in a separate building due to its particular nature, the Guard Corps Commander's office was near the entrance, and the Medical Department Head operated out of the infirmary that everyone avoided.
So for Laura, the youngest staffer in food supplies, to climb past her own department head's office and keep going upward was plainly unusual.
An ordinary staffer would never have reason to go higher at all.
Is Adam arguing with the Chairwoman again?
But if this wasn't Food Supplies Management's junior staffer Laura Edelwein but rather Adam Caines's friend Laura Edelwein, the story changed.
She had, in fact, already visited the Finance Director's office on the top floor several times, and the other staff knew her, so they occasionally entrusted her with documents to deliver.
Startled by the sudden clattering crash she had heard, Laura hurried up the stairs.
That Adam. Always finding trouble for himself.
He had been the same way back at the academy. Adam himself probably didn't see it that way, but he was constantly causing incidents.
Convincing the professors that a building was going to collapse so they had to postpone the entrance ceremony, bracing for a monster attack during outdoor training, or asking her to help him track down some regressor or whatever.
Once she learned Kassandra was behind all of it, she had been floored by his naivety. Taking the word of that sham prophet at face value?
He was different now, but whenever she thought of the academy-era Adam, she couldn't quite suppress a dry laugh.
I'll just check and go.
Adam was surely swamped with the terrorist attack and the donation issues right now anyway. However close they were as friends, this was firmly work hours.
She could check in after he got off duty, or over a drink later.
With that thought, Laura approached the Chairwoman's office where she had heard the noise and knocked.
"Madam Chairwoman? Finance Director? I heard a sound and just—"
"Another dream."
"...Finance Director? Wait, Adam? Why are you alone? Where is the Chairwoman?"
"A stubborn dream."
Inside the Chairwoman's office was Adam. That in itself was nothing unusual. Adam came and went from the Chairwoman's office all the time.
The Chairwoman's absence was not particularly alarming, either. She might be out for a stroll, or she might have stepped away somewhere briefly.
If there was a problem, it was Adam himself as he slowly rose to his feet.
"Hold on, Adam. Did you fall? I've told you. A 1st Rank really has to look after his health."
"That takes me back."
"Huh?"
"Laura. You always used to worry about me like that. Back at the academy, and after I became the Finance Director too."
Step.
Adam walked toward her. That was all.
Laura felt the back of her neck go cold and damp in an instant.
Cold sweat? Why?
"Every now and then you'd say things about graduate school that made no sense, but you were a good friend."
More than that, had Adam's voice always been this low? It felt heavier than usual.
And why were his eyes so clouded over? As if he were dead.
And then. And then—
...Why was she so afraid?
"Laura."
"Hik—"
"That was why I hated you."
"...What?"
"Because you left me with words like those. Because you became a stain on my memory that won't wash out. Because you make me cry at night for no reason, remembering you."
Thump.
Laura's legs gave out and she collapsed, but Adam simply walked past her in silence.
As if not a single lingering attachment remained.
"If the memories only ever hurt to recall."
"............"
"Then I'd rather not see them even in a goddamn dream."
His expression as he spoke was not so much sorrowful as it was blank. Empty.
And because she could not fathom why Adam would suddenly wear such an expression, why he would say such things—
Laura held her breath, utterly still, until Adam had left the room.
...It felt as though that was the only thing she was allowed to do.
*
Today, she was going to meet her no matter what.
With that resolve, Beatrice headed for a particular dormitory. She was still in her work clothes from the part-time job she had finished just moments before.
In the Magic Department, Beatrice in her work uniform was practically a local fixture, but in the Administration Department, the reaction was different. Students who had not recognized her at first soon began to murmur.
"Isn't that the princess of the Delphia Kingdom? Why is she dressed like..."
"You haven't heard? That princess works a job. In a grocery store, no less."
"Why on earth?"
"How would I know? Probably some commoner-life-experience thing."
There were a few warm glances, but in the Administration Department, where many students were commoners or relatively poor, Beatrice did not draw friendly looks.
Unlike the Magic Department, filled with the children of nobility and the well-to-do, the actual commoners in Administration could easily see Beatrice's behavior as mockery.
And on the other hand, they were students ground down by extreme competition who simply needed something to sink their teeth into.
Beatrice, however, ignored every last gaze and walked straight toward the dormitory.
She was long accustomed to such looks.
Compared to what I got at the royal palace, this is practically affection.
The students, at least, did not dress up their scorn in elaborate euphemisms about her uselessness, nor did they suggest that since her face was passable she might as well be sent off as a concubine.
Beatrice possessed a talent certified by the Archmage himself, but a chronic condition prevented her from wielding it, and inside the royal household that had made her little more than a lightning rod.
The one person who had shielded her from the worst of it was her brother Zeke.
...What was he thinking?
Crown Prince Zeke had entrusted her to the Finance Director and returned home.
Beatrice still could not understand why he had disguised her as an attendant during the negotiations, nor the things Zeke had said to her, nor his parting command that she was to stay at the academy no matter what happened next.
The Beatrice of the present was different from the Beatrice of the past. She had overcome her chronic condition, however provisionally, and had grown to the point where she could wield teleportation magic in an instant. If she returned to the Delphia Kingdom, her standing would change dramatically.
So why was Crown Prince Zeke determined to keep her tethered to the academy?
She still had no answer, but for now she would focus on the matter at hand.
With that resolution, Beatrice fixed her attention on one of the dormitories tucked inside the building.
Milia.
The girl she had met during the uninhabited-island midterm exam and had since gotten to know through repeated encounters.
An Administration Department student who was nevertheless a 3rd Rank mage, born a commoner but suspected of concealing her true identity.
She had even received an invitation to join the Student Council.
Beatrice had planned to grow closer to her and use that connection to arrange a meeting with the Student Council President.
But Milia had abruptly changed her attitude.
She dodges me when I try to talk to her. Avoids meeting me at all. Makes excuses and refuses whenever I try to set a time.
She was dodging Beatrice with unmistakable clarity.
Until now, other business had kept Beatrice from dwelling on it, but things were different now.
The situation with her brother Zeke had given her an unexpected stretch of free time, and she had come in person to seize the opportunity and settle matters with Milia once and for all.
Milia was practically her sole link to the Student Council. Without her, the only remaining option was to ask the Finance Director for help, and what could she possibly ask of that pitiable man?
Only if there truly is no other way.
...Truth be told, being brushed off by the Finance Director a few days ago still stung. She hadn't realized he was close enough with Chloe and Rus that they could approach him so familiarly, but if even they had all gotten the cold shoulder, perhaps she ought to count that as a mercy.
Either way, she could not quite bring herself to face the Finance Director again just yet.
So she would have it out with Milia directly. Having made her decision, Beatrice cut through the alley and arrived in front of the dormitory—
And at that very moment.
"...Beatrice?"
"Huh— Fin-Finance Director?"
The dormitory where Milia lived sat between out-of-the-way alleys, with almost no foot traffic. Most of the students who had been watching Beatrice with idle curiosity had already gone on their way.
Which meant the only people standing in front of the dormitory right now were Beatrice and Adam, who had appeared without warning.
Her shock at his sudden arrival lasted only a moment.
"Seeing you turn up in one of these... that's a first."
"No, I... sorry?"
"I wasn't as attached to you as I was to Laura, so why are you showing up in my dreams? Is this some leftover from that damn game? It's disgusting."
"Fi-Finance Director?"
"Bear with me. When you wander through nightmares every night, talking to yourself becomes a habit. Doing this... it almost feels like going back to those days and having a real conversation."
He had appeared out of nowhere and was now spilling incomprehensible words.
Before she could even begin to find the dissonance in Adam's speech, Beatrice's face hardened and she instinctively stepped back.
It was not fear. She felt no threat to her life. Whatever this strange version of Adam was, he was still a 1st Rank.
But—
Something...
Something deeply, viscerally wrong and sinister was oozing out of Adam's body.
It was something Beatrice, with her innate sensitivity to mana, could feel.
And yet to say Adam himself had been consumed by that something—
"Damned sword. Wouldn't even let me use it because I wasn't worthy, and now it leaves me with aftereffects like this. Right?"
"............"
"...Thought you'd say one of your game lines, but I guess I don't remember that one. Nightmares really are something."
Adam was lucid. Or... was he?
To be precise, Adam's ego itself was clearly intact. But something about him was different from the Finance Director she knew.
Before Beatrice could firmly identify that dissonance, that gap—
"Don't go back to the Delphia Kingdom."
"......What?"
"I only played up to Part One of the game, so I never knew. But when I couldn't stop you from going back, that's what became of you. We were only acquaintances in the game, but I wanted to warn you."
"W-wait. What did you just say?"
"What the hell are 8th Ranks even good for anyway. That bastard Zeke is insane too. 8th Rank, whatever—everyone just dies."
"My brother Zeke?"
"Hell, maybe I'm the insane one. Reality's turned into that mess and here I am running my mouth in a dream."
Adam laughed. It was a self-mocking laugh, worlds apart from his usual one.
It was only a laugh, and yet the weight of emotion inside it felt so unbearably heavy that—
Without fully understanding why, Beatrice closed her mouth.
"Anyway, what is this place? I've never seen this building before... probably some memory I half-noticed while passing by."
"...It's Miss Milia's dormitory."
"What?"
His expression had already been blank, but now it sank deeper still. The atmosphere soured so abruptly that even Beatrice, who had answered him, was caught off guard.
Adam stared at the dormitory in silence.
".........Are my memories jumbled together? Or is it that bitch's scheming? No—actually, this works out fine."
"Finance Director?"
"I told you this once before. Just call me by my name."
"What?"
"Even if it's only a dream, there's only one person who gets to call me that."
Still speaking words she could not decipher, Adam walked toward the dormitory.
Beatrice hurried to follow—
"......!"
And only now did she see Adam's back as he moved ahead of her.
It was the Finance Director's back, the one she had always seen. But this time, there was something else there.
A sharp dagger lay discreetly hidden behind his back.
The sight stopped her mid-step. In that pause, Adam entered the dormitory.
Slam!
As if warning her not to follow. He slammed the door shut behind him. Hard.
*
"Fi-Finance Director? You told me I could leave for the day, so why are you suddenly...?"
"I thought this was the usual nightmare about the Dark Sword. Then a name turned up in the dream that has no business being here."
"Wh-what do you mean?"
"Weren't you supposed to be busy playing savior? The so-called Pope's schemes are as ugly as ever."
"............Does this make any sense to you?"
"Chloe will wake me up soon enough anyway. When I open my eyes, be ready. I swear I'll throw you alive into the Western Wasteland or the Delphia Ruins."
"The Delphia Ruins. So it's real. You're the real Adam Caines."
"You're telling me there's a fake one, too?"
"No. There isn't one. No fake. You're just the Adam Caines I know, that's all."
Having finished her conversation with the Archmage and hurried back to prepare for rest, Milia smiled.
For the first time in a long while, it was not the Finance Department's drudge Milia who smiled, but the true Pope Milia.
Whether past or present, she fixed her gaze on the single most grating existence.
"Welcome, Adam Caines. As your senior, let me offer you a proper greeting."
"What?"
"Right now, you happen to have... come back."
The pupil of her mirthful eye—
Slowly began to split.